


Swallow It Whole

by mattzerella_sticks



Series: Season 15 Inspired [25]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angry Sam Winchester, Angst, Dean Winchester Has Issues, Emotionally Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt Castiel (Supernatural), Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt Sam Winchester, Lies, M/M, Post-Episode s15e16 Drag Me Away (From You), Self-Sacrificing Dean Winchester, Tired Castiel (Supernatural), Tired Dean Winchester, Truth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-23
Updated: 2020-10-23
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:01:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27158326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mattzerella_sticks/pseuds/mattzerella_sticks
Summary: "The older you get... the less lies make everything better"But when you've told as many lies as Dean has, it's hard to tell what's true and what's not. How can he remove all the rotten parts of himself without bringing everything down? Which lies have ingrained themselves so firmly, that removing them would change everything about who he was?And, scariest of them all, who would he be without those lies?Coda to 15x16 "Drag Me (Away From You)"
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Series: Season 15 Inspired [25]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1517543
Comments: 14
Kudos: 66





	Swallow It Whole

**Author's Note:**

> So that... was an episode 👀
> 
> My opinion - they did a lot for such a little reward as Dean telling Sam what Cas told him. Using a young Dean and Sam to re-emphasize something we know by heart was a misuse of time. The writer did drop some nice things in there, little gems. But the best was the end.
> 
> Episode should've been called "Drag Me (Through This Episode)"
> 
> Anyway, I digress, enjoy the below fic!

Dean doesn’t stop him. The fire in Sam’s eyes, tense set of his shoulders – it’s suicide. Anything he said would be met with a sharp tongue that cuts worse than any knife and acid words which will scar indiscriminately. He’s tired anyway. Weighed down by over forty years of waking nightmares, a heavy, iron ball in his stomach. They cut his fuel line, letting it bleed along the road home.

He climbs out of Baby, once the echoes of Sam’s footfalls lessen considerably. Slinks towards the trunk for his duffel. Sam’s still there, untouched. Forgotten in his anger. Dean leaves it, too. Bag swinging with every step, dangling off his fingers.

His phone vibrates, chirping with a text. Cas, _Have you told_ …

Rolling his eyes, Dean offers a curt reply. Dean tries pocketing it again, only his phone starts ringing. He answers immediately, “Cas…”

“Sam knows?”

“Yeah,” Dean says, shuffling down the hallway. Darkness ahead and behind, reminding Dean of how empty their home is. Haunted. A chill races up his spine. “He wasn’t too keen on it, either.”

Cas softly huffs over the line, “I had a feeling.”

“Yeah, yeah… your _feelings_.” His imagination recreates the night before. Their last conversation face-to-face. Cas looking soft in such a sad way, that cruelly tempted Dean. Urged his hand forward, like he can force a smile with a simple brush of his thumb. A band-aid on a mortal wound. He almost did it, then. Even now, it twitches at his side. Like he can reach through the phone and touch stubble. “You think it’ll make a difference?” he asks.

“I hope so.” Cas hums, the sounds of tires rolling on asphalt filling the background. He’s still on the road. “Two heads are better than one.”

“And three?”

“…Is that an offer?”

He wishes it was. Dean enters his room, flicking the light on. Dumps his bag without care and slams the door behind him. Shutting himself off from the rest of the world. “This is the best shot we got,” he tells Cas, “and I doubt you’ll find anything in the next few days that’ll top Billie’s.”

“We will,” Cas says, “we have to… for Jack.” He pauses, finger on the trigger. Tapping at it, Dean waiting for the blow. “If you… if you tell him that he doesn’t… that _this_ won’t make up for Mary’s death, that might change his mind.”

It would. Cas mentioned Jack’s motivations, and Billie confirmed it… though Dean held no doubt about that. Dean sat with this truth for longer than he’d like, asking himself in an infinite loop if this can really balance the scales. Each time, the answer remained the same. A loss is a loss, and Dean’s tired of losing. Jack’s death won’t heal her absence. Hadn’t when Chuck smote him, and he doubts it’ll hurt less if Jack returns the favor.

But then he thinks about the other choices. Losing his son or losing the _world_.

Caitlin made a point, that lying won’t make anything better. For other people. Tell yourself enough lies, and you can convince yourself of even the most improbable things. Like how he has room for a few more. “I can’t do that, Cas.”

When he speaks those words, Cas deflates. Verbally, with a low hiss. Visually, he must mirror how he looked under the Bunker’s dim lighting. Weary, dragged through hell with miles to go. Unraveled and strung out for vultures that circle. His chest slams against his ribcages. Beating a mournful drum, the same cadence with which Cas walked from Dean’s side. Onto a ruinous path he couldn’t follow. How he yearned for it, though.

“Dean,” Cas starts. Voice trembling, unsure. “you can’t do this for Jack?”

He’d do everything for him. Switch roles, become the bomb, take Chuck and Amara into the sunset with him. Billie laid the plan out very clearly, any deviation from it would be _very_ painful. His wants… aren’t important. Never were. There’s very little he can control. “No,” he whispers, blinking back tears, “I… I can’t.”

“Would you do it for me, then?”

“Cas…” It’s easier repressing these. Especially so without distractions like Cas’s hair, his eyes, the little cleft on his chin and the warmth that constantly radiates from his body. “I can’t.”

“I see…” The detachment in Cas’s words shouldn’t hurt as much as they do. He can’t ever believe this lie. “Then it’s me and Sam, then? _Alone_ …”

Possibly. Dean bets his brother skipped past his room, exchanging sleep for the Bunker’s trove of secrets. Like they might hold more than the manifestation of Death, herself. Which… “Billie might pop in,” he warns, “not to help, obviously. She’ll be… making sure the house is in order.”

Cas chuckles, the noise uncharacteristically grating his ears. “I’ll be ready for Billie.”

“Will you?”

“I killed her once.”

“When she was a reaper,” Dean rubs at his jaw, “promise me you won’t take any unnecessary risks… rock the boat too much.”

“I can’t do that,” he parrots him, uses Dean’s words against him. One lie for another. “It’s getting late… is there more you’d wish to say or…”

He can apologize. Cry, tell him how Jack’s sacrifice hurts with the same fury Cas must feel. That they’ve bucked fate before, their family can do it again. How there’s hope the four of them can see this final battle through. A peaceful future exists, where Jack is alive, and Sam isn’t angry with him, and Cas _stays_. With him. And Dean can finally… he allows… he _feels_ …

Dean swallows each and every prayer, scowling. “No,” he says, “night.”

“Goodnight, Dean.”

Cas drops their call. Dean stays on, listening as the ringer flatlines. Then, when the quiet returns, he remains there. Phone pressed on his cheek, rooted to the spot.

His stomach lurches, startling him into action. On wobbly legs Dean stumbles towards his bedroom sink, leaning over the porcelain. Gagging on all the mistruths and almost-saids he forced down his throat. Sick from his own bullshit. Tears freely flow down his cheeks while he coughs, choking, fighting himself.

Dean loses. A simple thing slips through, “I don’t want…” Then, the next. “Jack, he –“ Dean gasps, drool pooling around the drain, “He doesn’t deserve this. Doesn’t need –“ He groans, sweating now, too. Eyes burning, blood vessels popping from the strain. “Cas, I want…” It’s stuck there, chained by years of pressure. Millions of lies – little ones he says easily like a blink. And the larger ones, that required gymnastics to make sense. “Please,” he says, “don’t go where I can’t follow, angel. I can’t lose both of you…”

He glances at his reflection. Expression sunken, face wrecked from it all. Flashes of Jack, with his eyes burned out. Cas on the ground, wings scorched into the earth.

Living with so many lies, it’s hard to parse through the truth. Dean knows one.

His life has never been fair.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been writing too many things that are soft and touchy-feely, I needed to inflict a little pain...
> 
> Let me know what you think!


End file.
